Drifting
by transdannyphantom
Summary: Takashi Shirogane can't really cope with what happened during his time with the Galra Empire. Or that he left Matt (and Sam) behind. He's barely surviving. What happens when they find a mining colony being run by the Galra? Will they find the Holts? Will Shiro get the help he needs?


_I had a dream that when I woke up you were finally there_ _  
_ _And I believed that all the hours turned to minutes, it's not fair_ _  
_ _And when I turned to look at where you should've been I started drifting_ _  
_ _I tried to stare into your eyes and realized that there was something missing_

The blue lights of the ship, while dimmed, still cast too much light across the sterile, near-empty room. The one with a bed much larger than he was used to. The bed lacking the heat of another body, so it was seldom used.

How long had it been? Days, certainly. Months? Maybe. There was a faint possibility that it had been a year or more. Time blurred together until he lost track.

Every day was pretty much the same anyway.

Wake up at an hour no one else would be moving, exercise in that sterile room he called his, then clean everything even though there wasn't even so much as a speck of dust. After that, he would head to the training room, and throw as much of his frustration and his heartache into beating the simulations for a few hours.

Everything he did was an attempt to drown out the feelings of hopelessness.

It never worked.

By the time the lights began to brighten, he had already been awake for something close to four hours, and it as time for him to shower. He had to uphold the appearance of being completely fine.

Breakfast, then more training, lunch, and a little bonding time. And still the thoughts of that empty bed, lacking that special someone, occupied his mind.

That is, when the horror of his missing year didn't.

Dinner came around like normal, loud noises and fantastic smells, not that he noticed much. He wore a small smile, and ate mechanically, nodding to conversations that he didn't really hear.

Time continued to pass, and with it, light years of distance between him and the one who could potentially make everything better.

Matt Holt.

Even the thought of his name was almost enough to reduce him to tears.

And so he retreated to his room, that sterile, near-empty room with the too large bed that was always cold. When the doors slid closed behind him with a hiss, he fell to his knees, head in his hands. Another reminder of the year he had lost, and what he had lost with it.

His right arm wasn't his. Metal from right above his elbow down, a cybernetic implant "gifted" to him by those who once held him captive. Who still held Matt captive.

It was cold against his face.

Nothing more than a physical jar to the system. A shock that cried out to all that he, Takashi Shirogane, current pilot of the Black Lion and head of Voltron, wasn't whole.

Pieces of his memory were still locked away in deep recesses of his mind.

The last thing he really remembered was saving Matt, and his father, Sam, from the arena in which he had become "Champion". Shiro wasn't proud of it, of what he had done in that accursed place, but he knew that both Sam and Matt had a better chance of survival being scientists or miners than being forced to fight for the entertainment of the Galra Empire.

Shiro had seen first hand just what they would pit the fighters against.

His hands gripped the white hair at the front of his head, out of place on someone who was only twenty-five. He shook, like a leaf in the wind, trying to keep his sobs contained.

When he had first been placed on a mission with Matt, to scout Kerberos and take samples back to Earth, he had been ecstatic. His boyfriend, the man he had been planning to ask to marry him when they returned from their two-year mission, was there with him. He had been over the moon.

Until they were captured, and suddenly, Shiro knew that both Holt men were in more danger than he himself was. Shiro had grown up fighting, had trained daily to endure everything that was required of a pilot. He was practiced in martial arts, and was the best damn pilot at the Garrison.

He had to be the one to take the fall.

And so he made it seem like he was lusting for blood, and attacked Matt. To wound him. To keep him out of the arena.

To keep the love of his life, and his future father-in-law, safe.

And now he was the one who had to lead and look after four teenagers, one of whom was Matt's younger sister, Katie.

A daily reflection of Matt's face and enthusiasm for electronics.

The lights in the room began to dim, marking it as after midnight. Not that it made much difference, they were deep in space, light years from home, and farther away from where Matt was. Drifting farther with each passing moment.

Shiro just had to hold onto the small sliver of hope that they would find the Holt's alive.

Pushing himself away from the door took a lot of energy, and Shiro couldn't find it in himself to muster it. Instead, he stretched his legs out in front of him, and let his head fall back. His eyes drifted closed.

The bed retained the military crispness it had been made with hours- days?- before. The mattress too big, and too cold, and too empty.

Shiro rarely slept anyway, why bother wrecking the bed? It was one less thing he had to look after when he woke up.

Sitting slumped on the floor, arms slipping from his head to rest on his stomach, Takashi Shirogane drifted into a fitful sleep.

 _The purple lights did nothing to brighten the room, shadows long and deep and everywhere you looked. Not that he could look very far._

 _His head was strapped in place, as well as the rest of his body, on an uncomfortable table tilted on an angle so that he was almost standing, if not for the fact that he was about a foot off the floor._

" _Ah, the Champion is awake. Splendid." A voice that was everywhere and nowhere, dark as the shadows, assaulted his ears. Shiro flinched, eyes slamming shut. Fear ran through his veins, like ice. "That will make everything so much easier."_

 _A clawed hand gripped his chin, hard, droplets of blood welling up over the cuts on his cheeks. "Open your eyes for me, Champion. I have a surprise for you."_

 _Shiro shook his head._

" _No?" The voice crooned, and it sounded wrong. Like broken glass crunching under a heavy boot._

" _Fine, then." The hand left his face. "Have it your way, Champion."_

 _Shiro heard the rattling of chains, and pained whimpers. Sounds that made his heart clench, for he knew the voices those whimpers belonged to. His eyes opened, and his fears were confirmed._

 _Matt and Sam, chained together, broken and bruised and bloody, were on their knees a few feet away from the end of the table. Sam had his head down, but Matt, Matt was looking directly at Shiro. The fear and pain in his eyes had Shiro struggling against his bonds._

" _No! Matt! Sam!" The straps around his body grew tighter._

 _The voice that had spoken before, everywhere and nowhere, emerged from the shadows, a body to match. Large and threatening, purple fur and fangs glinting out of the beasts mouth. "Do I have your attention now, Champion?"_

 _Shiro fell silent, but continued to struggle, as futile as it was._

 _The beast reached one clawed hand out, and lifted Sam's head, fingers curled around his chin. "Now, watch me, Champion." The other hand came down hard on the back of Sam's head._

 _With one swift movement, Sam's neck was snapped. His brown eyes were unseeing, but staring at Shiro. His body fell to the floor, pushed roughly away by the thing that had killed him. Matt let out a choked scream, as did Shiro, and jerked forward as if to catch his father. Shiro fought hard against the straps that held him in place, the thick leather cutting into his skin. He was bleeding, he felt it, but still, he had to try and get to Matt._

 _The beast moved to Matt._

" _No! NO! Take me instead. Not him. Not Matt." Shiro was sobbing._

" _Takashi." Matt's voice was a whisper, but it cut him deep. "I love you."_

 _Those large, furred, clawed hands wrapped around Matt much like they had Sam._

" _No! NO! Matt!"_

 _And in a second, Matt, too, was gone._

 _Shiro was screaming, and struggling, and then, all he knew was the white-hot burn of some injection rushing through his body._

" _And, now, Champion, time for a little fun."_

It was the first time in a long time that Shiro jolted awake with the sound of a scream echoing in his ears, bouncing off the walls of his sterile room. Distantly, he knew it was his own voice he had heard, his own screams that had woken him.

But the memory of Matt's eyes, looking at him as they drained of life, still shining with tears, and the words he had said so many times before warped and twisted with the knowledge that he was going to die had struck Shiro cold.

His deepest fear was not finding them.

His deepest fear was watching them die and not being able to stop it.

Taking a shaky breath, Shiro glanced at what passed for a clock on the ship. Just a little after two in the morning, Earth time. It would have to do.

After a dream like that, Shiro knew he wasn't going to get any more sleep that night. Two hours would be brutal on his system, but he had done it before.

He pushed himself to his feet, and began stretching to get the knots out of his back. That's what he gets for falling asleep sitting against the door.

He went about his normal routine, not sparing a glance to the bed where he knew he wouldn't find a brunet with messy hair and drool on his cheek. He did yoga, loosening his muscles and testing his flexibility, before moving onto his usual workout.

An hour passed before he finally felt the need to stop, and cleaned up any evidence that he had both slept on the floor and had been sweating heavily. Three-thirty.

He was like a ghost as he walked through the halls to the training room, silent footsteps so that he would not alert anyone that he was awake. Not that anyone else would be.

Once in the training room, he queued up the simulation for training level six, and got ready. And he fought.

It was what he was good at.

But it didn't help him.

Sure, he was strong, and fast, and with his daily training, he kept up with his martial arts, but his thoughts drifted more often than not. His body was on autopilot, and his mind was back in the holding cells of the Galra, or in the arena, or getting flashes of that room with the table and the straps that he knew he had been in at least once.

His arm was proof of that.

What else had they done to him? He wasn't sure.

And fighting didn't help.

But it was all he could do.

It was what he was good at.

"Shiro?"

He startled, having not heard the hiss of the doors opening or the call to end the simulation. It was his name that drew him out of his thoughts, heart racing not from exertion but from the remembered horror he had seen. Had lived through.

Slowly, he turned. Coran, the advisor to Princess Allura, and the one who looked after all of the paladins, stood just inside the doorway. His face was serious, an unusual expression on the man, who was normally so very jovial it almost physically hurt.

"Walk with me."

It wasn't a request.

Sighing softly, Shiro followed after Coran, keeping a few steps behind.

They walked in silence for a while, Coran's clipped footsteps and Shiro's heavy breathing the only sounds heard. The rest of the castle was asleep, lights dimmed, the generators and life support systems giving off a comforting hum that was easily tuned out.

Coran lead them to the control room, the projection of planets and solar systems hanging in the air. It seemed that Coran had been awake for a while as well.

In the centre of the room, Coran turned to face Shiro. "Take a look at this, here, Shiro." He gestured to an image of a small sun.

Coran made a few movements with his hand to make what he was showing larger.

"What am I looking at, Coran?"

"This, right here," Coran said, pointing to a large asteroid belt, drifting ever so slowly apart, "is what remains of Altea."

Shiro sucked in a breath.

"I am showing you this, Shiro, because, while we may not know exactly what you had gone through when you were a prisoner of the Galra Empire, nor what you faced as their Champion, there are those of us that deal with the nightmares and sleepless nights that you do. You do not have to face it alone."

Shiro eyed the projection, pieces of a planet long lost drifting in space. The only two known survivors were here on this ship. One of them, at the very least, had watched as the planet began to burn. How painful that must have been.

Shiro closed his eyes. "I dream that I am still in the arena. Or in the room where I lost my arm. Or in the cells. All of which I am watching him die. Or else, I dream that we are back on Earth, and he is laying beside me in bed like we used to, but it will be wrong and he will fade and I wake up reaching for him."

"Him?"

"Matt. Matt Holt."

Coran was silent, allowing Shiro to gather his jumbled thoughts, which he was grateful for.

"He was- is- my boyfriend. Three years we were- have been- together. I was- am- going to ask him to marry my, when we got back to Earth." Shiro pressed his left hand to his forehead, needing to feel the skin to prove that he was still human. "I did a lot of terrible things in the arena. Things that I do not still fully remember. But they haunt me. Would Matt still want me if- when- we find him?"

Coran hummed thoughtfully, one hand reaching up to twist his moustache. "I do not know what a 'boyfriend' is, but I can assume from the context that he was your romantic partner. Now, if you were as close as I believe you were, why would you think that he would not want you for a past that you both share, hmm?"

Coran placed a hand on Shiro's shoulder, causing him to look up. "You protected him from the arena, did you not?"

"Yes, but-"

"And you made sure that he and his father stayed together, yes?"

Shiro nodded.

"Then, I am sure that when, not if, we find them, everything will be as it should be." Coran gave Shiro a small smile. "Now, you should probably try and get some more sleep, paladin. Can't fight Zarkon when you look like a Sandarin Knorfalk."

It was a few days later that they came across a mining colony being run by the Galra Empire. There was only a small fleet, clearly just an outpost meant for the mining of the planet.

"All right, paladins." Allura said, voice sounding strong in the ears of the five pilots. "This may just be an outpost, but that does not mean that they are unarmed. Disable the ships in anyway that you can, and rescue the miners."

"Right." Shiro said. His voice was serious, his focus strong. That little sliver of hope was buried, he needed to be the leader for his team, needed to be present in the moment. "Pidge, you are to head to the planets surface. Make sure you are not seen."

"On it." Pidge, or Katie, said. Her voice was so much like Matt's.

Shiro shook his head to clear his thoughts. Focus.

"Lance, Keith, you two are to take out the larger ships and the mining station once Pidge gives the word."

"I bet I can take out more than you can, Mullet-head!" Lance called out over the comm system.

"You're on!" Keith rose to the bait, and they were off.

Shiro sighed. "Hunk, you and I are distractions. Take out as many of the fleet as you can, and then go help Pidge with pulling out the miners."

"Uh, right. Got it."

And the battle began.

Explosions were all around, and the sound of Lance and Keith bickering over the comms was a little too much for Shiro to bear. But he grit his teeth, and continued shooting down any ship that came at his lion.

It was clear that Zarkon wasn't here, and there weren't even any high-ranking generals to give direction, so the fleet fell quickly. Hunk had headed to the surface to assist Pidge. Shiro was guard for them, driving the remaining members of the fleet away and shooting them down. Lance and Keith had already destroyed what they needed to, still bickering, waiting for Pidge's signal.

Shiro couldn't focus anymore. His left hand was clenched against the controls of his lion, white-knuckled, an attempt to keep himself grounded. He was counting backwards from twenty, he was forcing himself to remember his breathing. If he could just hold out until they made it back to the castle, he could fall apart in peace.

Pidge interrupted him. "I found them!"

"Found who, Pidge?"

"My family!"

Shiro froze, eyes wide. She found them? They were here?

His heart was hammering in his rib cage, trying so hard not to get his hopes up. "You're sure, Pidge?"

"We found them, Shiro! We found them!"

Pidge's happiness was contagious, but Shiro had to see for himself.

"Have you got everyone out?" He asked, willing his voice not to crack.

"Yeah. We got them all. Fire it up, boys."

Lance's whoop was heard just a second before the explosion, followed closely by a dejected "oh, man." Apparently, Keith had fired first.

"Everyone, back to the castle. We'll meet up in the control room. Good work." Shiro could barely sit still. There were too many emotions rushing through his body, he was practically vibrating.

When he emerged from his lion, he was running full tilt to the control room. He had been the last one to return, making sure that everyone else had before he did was part of his job as leader, but he couldn't wait any longer. He had to find out that this was real.

That Matt was here.

He burst into the control room, noticing that is was full of people all covered in dust, before his eyes locked onto a familiar head of messy brown hair.

Pidge stood beside him, happy tears in her eyes. Her father, as dust-covered as the rest of them, holding her tightly as if afraid that she would disappear.

But Shiro didn't pay any attention to that.

His eyes were firmly on Matt.

He didn't even realize that he was moving, rescued miners parting like the Red Sea. He just had to get to Matt.

And then Matt turned, and their eyes met, and Matt let out a sob. And Shiro was running.

They met in the middle of the room, arms wrapped tight around each other like they were each others life line. Matt was on his toes, because Shiro was at least half a foot taller than he was, but it didn't matter, because Matt was here in Shiro's arms.

"Oh, gods, Matt. I missed you so much." Shiro buried his face into the crook of Matt's neck, uncaring that he smelled of dirt and dust and sweat. He smelled like Matt, like _home_ , and it was all Shiro could do to not break down in heaving sobs. Instead he pressed kisses to Matt's neck and shoulders, and tightened his hold as much as he dared.

"I missed you too, Takashi."

Matt's voice was exactly as he remembered it, and Shiro lost all of his fragile control. His knees buckled, and he was sobbing, and Matt _was here_.

The box he carried in his pocket at all times, and had since before the Kerberos mission, something the Galra didn't take from him, was burning, and he pulled away gently. His right hand, the hand that wasn't really his, reached down and grabbed it, tugging it from it's hiding place.

"I was going to wait until we got back to Earth to ask, but, uh," Shiro flipped the box open.

Matt gasped, and then started laughing. He, too, pulled out a small box from his person, something that the Galra had overlooked, and opened it up. "I had the same idea."

Shiro flushed, before pulling Matt into a deep kiss.

There were catcalls that sounded from the crowd, but for once, Shiro's thoughts weren't drifting.


End file.
